[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 7]
[Senate]
[Pages 9450-9451]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        MURDER OF NICHOLAS BERG

  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I join my colleagues and the American 
people in expressing outrage at the vicious murder of American citizen 
Nicholas Berg in Iraq. I extend my sincere sympathy to Mr. Berg's 
family and friends, who have had to confront a terrible loss in the 
context of a barbaric public display.
  No one should be misled by the claims of the terrorists responsible 
for this atrocity. They purport to be retaliating for the abuse of 
Iraqi prisoners by American soldiers. But this is a lie. These people 
seek to kill us and kill our children because that is at the core of 
their agenda, because they derive power from inspiring fear and horror. 
They do not need a pretext for their brutality.
  We express our disgust at the scandalous treatment of Iraqi prisoners 
because our country stands for basic principles, for the rule of law, 
for the dignity of the individual. We hold ourselves to high standards, 
and generations of Americans have shed blood to protect those standards 
and uphold our principles. We do not call for an investigation of these 
prisoner abuses in the hopes of placating terrorists. We call for an 
investigation and for full accountability because that is the right 
thing to do.
  And in the broader fight against terrorism, we speak, wisely, of the 
need to win hearts and minds in the Arab and Muslim worlds, where 
millions of good and decent people question American intentions and 
actions. We insist, quite rightly, that the basic norms and standards 
of conduct embodied in the Geneva Convention not be undermined, because 
those same Conventions protect our own troops when they are in harm's 
way. But our efforts are not aimed to influence the behavior of 
terrorists. No one has any illusions about the nature of these people. 
We will not change their minds, or win their hearts, or convince them 
to uphold basic standards in their conduct. One has only to recall the 
horror of September 11, or consider the murder of Nicholas Berg, to be 
certain about that.

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